


On the Night of the Full Moon

by Lt_Zoe_Jebkanto



Series: The Unnamed Road [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Friendship, Gen, School, Teen Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-18
Updated: 2014-04-18
Packaged: 2018-01-19 20:05:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1482250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lt_Zoe_Jebkanto/pseuds/Lt_Zoe_Jebkanto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Snape knows James, Sirius & Remus are up to something.  Now Sirius knows that Snape knows, and it's time to do something about it.  Sirius Black's POV.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Betrayal

**Author's Note:**

> I always wondered WHAT the details were that stirred the cauldron of emnity between Moony, Padfoot & Prongs and Snape. So, here's my take on it.

On the Night of the Full Moon 

 

Chapter One  
Betrayal

 

James was silent all the way from Dumbledore’s office. Except for his body. That said all kinds of things. From a few feet back, I heard his shoes slamming angry footsteps up the stairs to Gryffindor Tower. His elbows punched the air behind him as he moved. Sharp, furious jabs. I told myself I didn’t feel every one of them. 

It was a lie.

“Vernal equinox,” he almost spat the password. The fat lady in the portrait guarding the common room door jerked awake. “Oh, it’s you two again!” she grumbled. I thought she’d add that students shouldn’t roam the halls so late at night. But there must have been something in James’s face that made her mouth snap shut. She slid aside to let him in, then narrowed her eyes at me. I knew she could tell I was in trouble and I deserved it. 

James didn’t go to his favorite chair by the fire. He began a circuit of the room to see if anyone was there, maybe asleep on a sofa or at a study table in a corner. Nobody was. Walking to the window, he stood staring out.

Let him turn, let him shout. I was ready. He couldn’t say a thing I hadn’t told myself already ten times since leaving the Headmaster’s office. But he kept staring up at the stupid full moon that had started all this! 

The silence got big, made a wall down the room between us. There was never a time in the almost five years I’d known James that I couldn’t talk to him. But words wouldn’t fix what I’d done. He had a right to every minute of his fury without me interrupting. 

When he spoke, he asked a question. “Why’d you do it, Sirius?” 

“Do what?” 

Exactly which one of the stupid things I’d done since supper was he referring to? 

James turned from the window. “You know you could’ve gotten Snape killed?”

Killed. Awful word. Too big to get my mind around, though it was a growing hole of dread in my guts. “But I didn’t!” I said before the hole could get big enough for me to fall into. “I wouldn’t have let it go that far.”

“Oh, yeah?” He sounded how I’d been trying not to feel since he’d rushed past me in the underground dark. Scared. “How do you know you could’ve stopped it? You let Snape go in the tunnel!”

Better to be angry than scared. I stepped toward James. Raised my voice a shade above his. “He was picking on Remus again!” 

“Yeah? So? He was doing what he always does! Big deal! You thought what you did was… what? Going to keep him from figuring out what Remus has been trying to hide since he came to school here?”

“Don’t be stupid!” I flared. 

The truth was, I hadn’t been thinking at all. If I had been, wouldn’t I have come up with a better idea? Like chasing him off, or, more fun, using an adhere-o spell to stick his robes to the door post of the Great Hall? Or maybe just punch him out… 

All I’d kept seeing as I ran out into the night after Snape, was how he’d slipped from the Great Hall after supper, way ahead of everybody else. Weird, remembering that so sharp and clear now, when I’d hardly given it any thought at the time. It was a few minutes after he’d gone, when Remus set down his fork, pushed aside his barely touched plate and started for the Entrance Hall, that I realized the significance of Snape’s disappearance. Then warnings began shouting in my head, loud as howlers. “Go after him, go after him! Something’s up! Go now!” 

I turned to James. Did he sense it too? But his chair was empty. Blast! I’d forgotten he had detention again! Laying my napkin over my half-empty plate, I rose and moved down the table toward the door. Careful, not too fast. Wouldn’t do to look like anything out of the ordinary was going on. Wouldn’t want to draw attention to the fact that I’m leaving, or that Remus is already gone… Not tonight. Got to keep the secret safe… Got to hurry… Got to move… got to go careful… got to…

It took all my will not to run. Stepping into the Entrance Hall, I spotted Snape and Remus at the foot of the stairs to Gryffindor Tower. Severus was dancing back and forth, back and forth in front of Remus, blocking his way up. 

“Skipped dessert tonight, didn’t you, Lupin?” Severus was asking as I moved closer. His eyes sparkled with something like glee, though he wasn’t quite smiling. “Where could you be off to in such a hurry?” 

Remus kept looking past Snape to the freedom of the stairs beyond. He sidestepped right, left, right again. Severus mirrored each move. Remus’s book-bag was held tight in trembling, white knuckled hands. He kept swallowing like his throat was dry and sweat beaded his forehead. Gooseflesh rippled the fine hairs on his wrists. It could have been chills but I knew it was more. 

This was bad, really bad. Through the arched window over the front door the sky was a dimming blue. The sun was going down. Soon the moon would come up and…

Soundless, I crossed the entrance hall. Snape never glanced my way. All his mind was on Remus. Drawing my wand, I stepped forward and pointed to where the tip of Severus’s own wand poked from the pocket of his robes. Raising my hand, I drew a high, sweeping arc in the air. “Expelliarmus!” I muttered. 

“What?” Snape gasped. His wand shot from his pocket and soared toward the ceiling. He grabbed for it and missed. It clattered to the floor. Remus leapt past him and sped away upstairs. Snape dove across the stones, then came up glaring at me, as his fist curled tight around his upside-down wand.

“Butterfingers!” I said, holding up my own wand.

“Blast you, Black,” he said, glancing around him and then up the Gryffindor stairs.

Remus was gone.

Snape’s face was white with anger. Later I wished I’d paid attention to him and what he did next. I could have distracted him til Remus and Madame Pomfrey were long gone. Instead I pushed past him and went up to the Gryffindor common room. 

I’d been caught up with the sight of the barely touched plate Remus left behind when he slipped from the Great Hall to drop off his books before going to the Hospital Wing. I was thinking, for as quiet as he was, the tower would seem kind of empty tonight. Like it always did when he was gone. Glancing out the window I made out two distant figures walking toward a large willow across the twilit grounds. There was a moment to wonder what it must be like to live in solitary exile each month, when an arc of light appeared on the grass. It widened, narrowed, vanished. The entrance hall door opening and closing! 

And, wait! There was Snape, moving through the shadows! 

Bloody hell! He’d gone out after them! 

I didn’t wait to see Madame Pomfrey turn back to the castle before dashing downstairs. 

For years Snape had been tailing James, Peter, Remus and me. He’d hide round corners or behind statues in the halls, listening to us talk. 

“Do you think,” he’d ask, if we caught him eavesdropping. “You can keep your secrets secret forever?” 

I sped through the Entrance Hall and out under the first scatter of stars. I saw Snape slip between two bushes and crouch to watch Madame Pomfrey walk back from the willow that swung its branches at anyone who didn’t know how to get past its spell.

Recalling his grin as his greedy eyes gobbled up the sight brought back my fury. I glared at James. “Snape had no business out there!” 

“Of course he didn’t, you idiot!” The anger left James’s voice. Became something quieter. Worse. “But I can’t believe you’d do anything so stupid.”

“Well, believe it!” 

Was it disappointment I’d heard in James’s voice? Turning away I walked to the fire. 

“What,” said James. “Did you say to make him go in there, anyway?”

In the flames I saw Snape’s eyes widen in surprise as I grabbed his collar and pulled him up out of the bushes. “I asked him what he was looking at.” 

“Yeah, then what?”

“He laughed. Said not to pretend I didn’t know. How he had waited a long time, but he’d figured out what we were hiding.” 

“Not him, Sirius. You. What did you say to him?”

What did it matter what else I’d said? Or why I’d gone with Snape into the tunnel under the Whomping Willow? It was over. Done. Unchangeable. Unless James thought I’d told Severus what to expect there. Said the word at the middle of the secrets. 

“I didn’t tell him, if that’s what you mean! I said that snooping in other people’s secrets was a stupid thing to do-”

“Stupid?” James’s voice almost cracked as his voice rose. “It was dangerous!”

I turned from the fire to face him. “Who’re you, talking to me about dangerous? This whole thing’s been dangerous! Ever since we found out where Remus goes at the full moon! Since we decided how to keep him company so he doesn’t have to face it alone! Since we got the transfiguration book out of the bleeding restricted section of the library and began teaching ourselves the spells for becoming animals! Discovered how to get past the Whomping Willow! It’s all been dangerous!” 

“But we understood it! It was our danger! Not Snape’s.” James shouted.

“Don’t you think I know that?” I snapped. 

I didn’t like Snape. Never had. Not from our first meeting! Hadn’t minded one bit the idea of putting a good scare into him so he’d stop spying on us. I hadn’t stopped to think I’d also be putting him in danger! 

James’s words drew pictures that pulled me back to where we’d been an hour ago. Showed the rising moon, the Whomping Willow and the tunnel below. But not how the three of us returned safe to the castle. My rage faded, leaving only the watery-limbed feeling I got back in Grimmauld Place, watching my Mother’s fury lash this way and that at whatever got in her way. 

I thought I’d left all that behind when I came to Hogwarts. Especially when the Sorting Hat sent me to Gryffindor House, not to my family’s traditional Slytherin. But that cascading temper had followed me here. Only now it was mine! 

One after another, the images came. Snape, ahead of me in the dimness of the tunnel, stopping to stare at its far end where a figure changed shape. His jaw dropping open as its form was revealed. But this time no James leaped past me to snatch at his robes. No James shouted to shatter the shocked trance that held us both. No James chased us up into the moonlight or spun with his great Quidditch reflexes to raise his wand and seal the entrance as we saw a dark form hurtling toward it… 

Fear danced cold fingers down my back, made me shiver. But I held my head up and stared James in the eyes. “I wanted to scare him! He knew about the opening under the tree! Said it was a matter of time til he learned what Remus was up to in there! So I used a branch to touch the knot in the trunk that stills the willow. I said he was an ignorant git who had no idea what he was talking about! But don’t let a little thing like that stop you, I said. Go right ahead then, take a look! See how much you don’t know!”

“That’s the stupidest thing I ever heard!” said James.

I turned back to stare into the flames. He caught my arm, tried to pull me round to face him. “What were you thinking, Sirius, if you were thinking at all? Or were you just completely mad? I thought I knew you, mate.” 

What was I supposed to say? Of course you know me? 

I didn’t know myself. I hated the reckless rage that had poured hot and dark through my veins! It was careless! Cruel! The sort of righteous arrogance I’d seen at home. I tried to jerk free of James’s grasp, but he held tight. “I was angry, okay? Seeing him smirk down his big old nose, saying he knew our secret! James, did you ever think maybe we didn’t always catch him spying? That places we thought were safe maybe aren’t? I wanted that smirk off his face! Wanted him to know for a minute what it was like not to feel so smug and secure!”

I heard the echo of rage in my words, though I didn’t feel it now. Didn’t feel the warmth of the crackling fire either, only the cold dread that was big enough to make my teeth chatter. 

I was the one who sounded smug! Spiteful! It was a relief to hear revulsion creep into my tone. And fear. “All the while I was talking to Snape, I kept thinking ‘better stop it now, Sirius, better be quiet!’ And the more I thought that, the more I didn’t want to stop!”

James’s hand dropped. “Okay, I get it! Snape’s a git, you were angry! Okay! This isn’t exactly about him. You set Remus up to take out your revenge on Snape for you!” 

“What do you mean?” 

But I knew. 

I hadn’t thought of it when the fury pounded blood in my ears. The knowing only came later, as Severus, James and I staggered up out of the dark. When James released the willow and sealed the grounds off from the tunnel and I became aware of the words Severus was panting. “There’s a werewolf in there! A werewolf!”

And I remembered who that werewolf was. 

I hugged my arms against my chest, wishing the fire had some warmth to it. Not that my shivers had as much to do with cold as with horror. “It’s over now,” I tried to reassure myself. “Professor Dumbledore told Snape not to talk about what he saw tonight.”

“Yeah?” It was good hearing anger back in James’s voice. We could both be angry with me. “How much do you think that’ll mean to Snivvelus tomorrow?”

“He said he saw a werewolf in the tunnel! He might think Remus is doing something with it for a class, not that Remus is…” I hated the desperation in my voice.

“He’s not stupid, Sirius! You as good as shouted the secret at him. Did you ever think what Remus will say when he finds out?”

“Remus? Find out? Why would he? Dumbledore swore Severus to secrecy…”

That wasn’t the point. I knew it. It had been Remus’s secret to tell. Or not to. Because we lived with him, James, Peter and I had figured it out and then vowed not to speak of it beyond our circle. Now, by giving in to a stupid impulse, I’d broken their trust. Let my fury get loose enough to twist like a snake in my hands. I hadn’t protected the secret, I’d turned it to a weapon of revenge! However bad I felt, whatever danger I’d put Snape in, it was now Remus who would be hurt the most by what I’d done. 

His worst fear was harming anybody while under the influence of the moon and I’d made that a real possibility tonight 

Regret ached in my throat. I stared at the fire. Saw the orange light break into prism pieces as sick, silent tears formed. 

“Oh, man, Sirius, you just don’t get it, do you?” said James behind me. I thought he’d say more. But a moment later I heard his footsteps moving toward the dormitory stairs. 

Should I go after him, say I did understand what he meant? No. He had a right to his disappointment. I had no business trying to talk him out of it. Not when I shared it.

I waited, giving him time to get into bed before I went up. Tonight I had no right to gather courage gazing into the eyes of my old friend. I had to find it in myself. Tomorrow, in the Hospital Wing, I’d need it to look into the eyes of another friend and cause him worse pain than I was feeling now. I only hoped my words wounded him less than if he learned from anybody else how I betrayed him.


	2. Admissions at Dawn

Chapter Two  
Admissions at Dawn

 

From a chair by my dormitory window, I watched the moon go down and realized it was about to release Remus for another month. As the sky darkened I imagined him sleeping off his first exhaustion in the safe-house Professor Dumbledore had created so he could come to Hogwarts, the so-called Shrieking Shack. Or maybe he lay curled in the tunnel that connected it with the school grounds. I saw the stars fade in the grey dawn and knew Madame Pomfrey would be getting a bed ready for him til he was well enough to come back to class. At sunrise, I watched her crossing the grounds with him from the Whomping Willow that guarded the tunnel’s entrance.

Should I go talk to him now or wait til later? I hadn’t thought to hurt him. Problem was, I hadn’t thought at all. Now I had to. Confessing later would be easier. For me, anyway. The world might end first, or, less likely, I’d figure out a reason that made some kind of sense for what I’d done. 

But what would be best for Remus? I wasn’t sure any amount of resting up could make hearing what I had to say easier. Waiting could increase the risk that old Snivvelus might decide to confront Remus before I could warn him that his secret was out. Oh, how Snape would love a chance to gloat. I could almost hear him. He’d spout the same sort of Slytherin snobbery as my family would if they learned something like this! 

How disgusting! Disgraceful! A werewolf at Hogwarts trying to pass himself off as a Wizard! No wonder they have such unsavory reputations! Allowing it must be more of Dumbledore’s lunacy! See how that idiot’s lowered the standards of the school! Not to mention that there could be danger!

Remus would be hurt and, maybe worse, ashamed.

I couldn’t wait! Things were bad enough, without him getting a surprise like that! 

The room was still. There was an hour til it was time to get up for breakfast. The curtains were drawn around the four-posters belonging to James and Peter. Remus’s, like mine, was open and unslept in. Rising, I tiptoed to my bed, tossed the blanket I’d wrapped around me on top of it, then started for the door. I was almost there when I heard something behind me. I turned. James, fully dressed, slipped out from behind his curtains. “Where are you going?” he asked.

“Where d’you think?” There was no defiance in the words. “To see Remus.”

“I’m coming with you,” said James.

“Why?” He was furious at me last night with good reason. Did he want to tell Remus before I made excuses for myself? Like I would, or could when there were none.

He shrugged one shoulder, quirked half a grin at me. “Why not? He’s my friend too.”

We slipped out of Gryffindor Tower without speaking. The deserted hallways echoed every footfall. Madame Pomfrey must’ve heard us, because she was leaning through the half open doorway leading into the Hospital Wing when we arrived. She had a finger raised to her lips. “What can I help you with?” 

I’d only come here twice before. Not to see Remus. We’d always waited for him to come back to our dormitory after the moon. So we wouldn’t draw attention to him, so it looked like we believed his story that an ill Mum was the reason for his absences. Once I was here to see James when he took a bludger to the knee playing Quidditch and once when I was bitten by an over-enthusiastic snap dragon during Herbology. Neither time was it so early or quiet as this. It was kind of creepy. 

“We’re here,” I whispered through the stillness. “To see Remus.” 

“Remus Lupin?” She raised an eyebrow and stayed firm in the doorway. “Why on Earth would you think…”

“Please,” I cut in. “We know he’s here-.” 

She frowned. “If you want to talk to your friend, you can do it in your dormitory…” 

I tried to peer past her into the dimness. Was he waiting just beyond the door or had he been whisked into bed already? “Madame Pomfrey, we live with him! We know why-”

James’s shoulder brushed mine as he stepped forward. “It’s important or we wouldn’t disturb him,” he said. “We know it was full moon last night and that he’s a werewolf.”

“And he knows we know.” I added, on a rush of gratitude that James had come.

She studied us both and after a long moment, moved aside. Beckoning us to follow, she led us to a curtained bed at the far end of the room. “Five minutes,” she said. 

James let me push aside the curtain and step through first. Remus lay with his back to me, burrowed deep within a nest of covers. Was he asleep already? He must be, to lie here so motionless like this. How could this still form have anything to do with what I’d seen a few hours ago beneath the Whomping Willow? I stepped closer. 

I’d never seen him so soon after the change before. Last night my final glimpse of him had been as he walked to the Willow with Madame Pomfrey. The figure was small and distant, but I had no doubt it was the same Remus Lupin I’d known for almost five years. Later, in the tunnel with Snape, there had been no sign of him. Instead there had been a swift and snarling creature leaping through the dimness toward us. A werewolf. A real werewolf with madness glinting in his eyes and sharp fangs gleaming huge in the dimness. Not a kid I knew at all… 

What would he be like this morning? 

“Remus?” I whispered. 

Blankets rustled as he shifted toward the sound of my voice. His head moved on the pillow. “Sirius! James! What are you doing here?” he exclaimed pushing himself up on his elbows. He stared at us with wide eyes.

No glints of madness now. They were Remus’s eyes. Sane and familiar again, but shadowed more deeply than any eyes I’d ever seen before. 

How exhausting must it be to undergo such a fearsome change as what I’d seen? Even after learning most of the steps in the animagus charm that would let me take on animal form, I knew now that I’d never come close to understanding how painful it must be for him. 

My transformation was voluntary. I had some discomfort as my bones shifted and reshaped themselves, but I knew I could control how fast it would happen, or decide to stop it altogether. He could do neither. The moonlight made all the choices. 

Right now, he looked as pale and thin as good parchment and so light that the weight of the blankets was all that’d keep him from blowing away in a strong breeze.

This was going to be bad. Hard. Awful. 

Would it be kinder to let him rest? I looked at James. He nodded at me, but then stepped back. This was, after all, my show, my Quidditch match. But his steady presence was there behind me. 

Gryffindor, I told myself. You’re a Gryffindor! The Sorting Hat said so. It said they have courage. You don’t want to make a liar out of it, do you? Get on with it, man.

“Remus, I have to talk to you.” Oh, yeah, real good. State the obvious, Sirius.

He nodded and gestured for me to sit on the end of the bed. 

I shook my head. Stayed standing. Squared my shoulders. No way to make it easier. Not for him. Not for me. No way to start except by starting. “I’m a stupid git.” I said.

He said nothing. Just tipped his head a little and waited. 

“Last night-” I began, then faltered.

I didn’t think a face could get paler than his had been. I was wrong. I saw his fingers curl tight and his eyelids squeeze shut like he was waiting for a blow. “Did…?” He swallowed hard. “Did I…? Are you here to tell me I bit somebody?”

“No, Remus, not that!” I perched on the edge of the bed. Made myself look at him. Twisted the hem of my robes so my hands wouldn’t shake. I could feel the aching loss of our easy comradeship, the laughter, the sharing of hopes and dreams as we lay in our four posters late at night, staring at the ceiling. 

“What?” Remus pushed himself from his elbows to his hands. His bones looked like sticks propped together to hold each other up as he leaned forward. “Sirius, tell me.”

Whether or not he was my friend after this was almost beside the point compared to the burden I was laying on him. “It’s Snape. If he hasn’t already put all the pieces together, he’s going to quite soon now.”

“Pieces?” Remus squinted, either at the morning brightness or in concentration.

I jerked my chin at the window. “You, the moon, the tunnel to the Shrieking Shack.”

“What?” A hand grabbed the sleeve of my robes. 

I eased from his grip as gently as I could and got back to my feet. His gaze rose with me. I pushed my hands into my pockets. “I’ll say this right out. He knew about the Whomping Willow. He watched you and Madame Pomfrey go out there! I hated seeing him trailing you like that, knowing he’s spied on us for all these years! And how he was holding you back on the stairs last night…”

“Wait!” James cut in. “What do you mean?”

I glanced at him. “Snape kept blocking the steps to the tower last night, wouldn’t let Remus go up to drop off his books. I think he wanted to test his theory and see what happened once the moon came up.”

“Stinking, stupid git,” said James. I could hear an echo of my own fury in his voice.

Remus’s face was still, waiting. I looked from him to James. “I kept thinking Snape won’t stop digging til he comes up with something! He won’t think twice what it’ll mean for Remus here! Or care! It’ll be like winning some kind of banner to wave all over school! Man, I’ve never been so angry…” 

I began walking back and forth along the side of the bed. “I thought if I scared him, he wouldn’t be so bleeding proud of himself! So I- I dared him to look in the tunnel!”

“Sirius, no!” I saw the fear that filled my guts fill Remus’s tired eyes

“James came and chased us out,” I said before his horror could get bigger. “Nobody got hurt. But any of us could’ve been. I risked us all last night, but mostly you. What I did’s going to have you at risk every day now, ‘cause Snape’ll know about you!”

I paused by the window, stroked the curtain, looked out at the trees. From here, I could see the Whomping Willow. It looked calm and innocent, swaying in the morning breeze. I began pacing again. I couldn’t stand still and speak at the same time. Truth was, looking at Remus’s strained face made words all but meaningless. “I didn’t know it’d go so far. Sorry doesn’t half say it, Remus.” 

There, I’d said all of it that had words. All that was left was to stop pacing and wait for whatever came next. 

I looked at James. What did it mean, this waiting? Nobody reacted to things I did with silence. My Father lectured, my Mother shrieked. I knew what to do with shouts or sermons. From Remus there was only stillness. 

“I guess,” he said at last, lowering himself to his elbows again, one careful bone at a time. “That you really didn’t get what it means to be a... Well, to be someone like me. That you understood-”

Had I ever heard anyone sound so tired before? So resigned? 

It was worse than having him shouting and angry.

Now he’d tell me how he’d trusted me. How I’d let him down. And he’d be right. 

I’d never realized til this moment how separate the lives we lived in our minds were from those we shared in our classes each day and dormitory each night. I’d had a glimmer of it once before. The night we met, I thought Remus had come a hard road to get to Hogwarts. But I’d guessed then it was to do with his bloodline. Being from my kind of family, that was the one burden I could understand something about. Even when I learned what his condition was, I hadn’t realized how lonely his journey had been. And still was.

“I’m sorry.” I said, looking straight at him through the heavy silence of the room. 

“Why should you be sorry about that?” Real surprise rounded his eyes. A grin quirked the corner of his mouth. “How much do I get what it’s like to be almost Wizard royalty?”

Wizard royalty. I made a face, remembering my first year in Gryffindor. Heard some of the kids say how great it must be, having wealth and power to get anything I wanted. So different than the confining realities. How often I wanted to shout “You don’t know what it’s like!” I’d never felt rich til I found friendship with James, Remus and Peter. They treated my name and my family like they were no big deal, til I mostly forgot they didn’t know what my life was like away from school. 

I nodded at Remus. Maybe he forgot sometimes that we didn’t know what it was like for him either. Forgetting was a lot less lonely. Before I could say anything, he went on. “How could you get how dangerous it is? I’m not talking about for me! But for you! I don’t ever want to risk hurting anybody! Especially not my friends!”

What was he saying to me? That we were still friends, maybe? 

I heard weariness in his tone, but was there anger in it too? Not in any form I recognized. 

I looked at James. Maybe there was something in his face I could understand. He was still angry with me, wasn’t he? Wasn’t he? 

There was no answer there. His eyes weren’t glaring, his jaw wasn’t clenched. “You know,” he split a look between Remus and me. “I was thinking after I went to bed last night that maybe Sirius did us all a favor.”

“What?” Remus and I exclaimed in unison. We exchanged confused looks.

“I’m not saying what you did wasn’t stupid, Sirius,” he cautioned. 

“Oh, well, thanks, James,” I said. “You know, I almost forgot that.”

He flashed me a brief grin. “And I won’t say it wouldn’t come down hardest on Remus if anything went wrong,” James moved closer to the bed, talking fast as, beyond the curtain, Madame Pomfrey’s footsteps echoed on the stone floor. “But here’s the thing. It could’ve been worse if Sirius hadn’t gone out after Snape. If he stayed in the common room, I wouldn’t have gone looking for him after I got off detention and…”

Remus groaned. 

“What?” I looked from one to the other. 

“Snape would’ve found a way into the tunnel,” said Remus. 

James nodded. “Yeah. And he’d have gone in there alone. If he didn’t manage it last night, he’d’ve worked out a way to do it next month. Or the one after that. What you did, Sirius, maybe satisfied his snooping for now. And we know it put a scare into him. That might keep him off our backs a while. And who knows? He could even honour his word to Dumbledore!”

“Yeah right,” I said, thinking how crazy I must’ve sounded when I said that same thing earlier. “How likely do you think that really is?”

“I don’t know.” James shook his head. “But it may’ve bought us time-”

“Dumbledore knows?” Remus interrupted. 

“Yeah,” James nodded. “I don’t know how she knew we were there, but when we came out of the tunnel, Madame Pomphrey was waiting with her wand in her hand.”

“She never let us say so much as word one,” I added. “Just marched all of us straight up to the Headmaster’s office.”

“After she left, Professor Dumbledore asked us a lot of questions…” said James.

“Mostly Snape, though.” I put in. “Like what made him go outside after supper.”

“And what he thought he saw in the tunnel,” continued James. “Snape said there’d been a werewolf in there, and-” 

Remus winced.

James looked full at him. “When Snape mentioned the werewolf, Dumbledore never said if he was right or wrong. Just that there were good reasons students weren’t to go near the forest. Whatever Snape believed he had or hadn’t seen, it was best for everyone that no tales got floating round school about werewolves or anything else that would lure us out for a look. He swore him not to talk about any of it...." 

Remus let out a long sigh. It seemed that whatever energy he had rode out on it as he lay back on the pillow. His eyes looked more tired than ever as he stared at the ceiling. “It’s not like I didn’t think this kind of thing might happen sooner or later,” he said.

“Well, now it has,” said James in a brisk, no-nonsense kind of voice, glancing over his shoulder at the curtain as Madame Pomfrey’s footsteps sounded louder. “And Professor Dumbledore’s going to be taking care of it. Along with the rest of us.”

Remus turned his head to look at James. “What do you mean, the rest of us?”

“Me, Sirius, Peter, who else? You know, we’ve played this whole thing down way too much. Trying to look like we hardly notice you’re gone every month, as if that might keep anyone else from noticing. Well, now we know that doesn’t work, don’t we? So, what we do instead is stick together. Keep a better watch. Right?”

James looked at me. I saw no anger in his face. That flat, disappointed sound wasn’t in his voice, either. Where had they gone? I didn’t get it. Maybe he was so caught up in finding a way to make things better there was no room for those feelings to show now. 

Whatever came later, it was great, having him trust me to help with that much. To at least say we’d need to stick together. “Yeah, right,” I said.

“Okay. Just you, Sirius and Peter,” said Remus. There was no mistaking the relief in his voice. At least for now his secret was something close to safe. “Okay, all right.” 

Behind us, the curtain rustled. “Five minutes!” called Madame Pomfrey. “Time to get to breakfast, Mr. Black, Mr. Potter. Mr. Lupin here needs his rest.”

“We’ll talk more later,” James said as she parted the curtain and stepped through with a large golden goblet in her hand.

“I have your potion for you, dear,” she said, moving to the head of the bed. “To help you sleep and regain your strength more quickly.” Her free arm slipped under Remus’s shoulders and lifted him to a sitting position. She made it look as if he were weightless. Tendrils of steam rose from the cup as she steadied it for him. 

Remus’s hands closed around it. He raised it to his lips, then paused. “One thing, first.” he said. 

I thought he would turn to James again, but it was me he looked at. “Sirius, did you take those notes for me in Charms like you said?” 

“Yeah…” I nodded. Could even a student like him really be thinking about homework right now? “Yeah, I did. I took them. Why?”

“Good.” His gaze held mine through the drifting steam. “I want to go over them later. Together, okay?” His smile was tired but deliberate.

The dread in my gut became a lump in my throat. 

Us. Together. After what I had done, he still wanted to be my friend! 

“Yeah, okay.” I managed to say as I returned his smile and turned to walk out of the Hospital Wing with James.


	3. Sunrise

Chapter Three  
Sunrise

 

The trip back to Gryffindor was faster than the one to the Hospital Wing had been. Our footsteps echoed along the early morning halls. “James,” I asked as we climbed the stairs to the Tower. “I thought Remus would be angry over what happened, didn’t you? Maybe he was at first. But… I don’t know… Then he wasn’t.”

“Does that surprise you?” James stopped halfway up the stairs to glance at me. 

“Yeah, kind of. I mean, he was still speaking to me when we left.”

“Well, what did you think?” James started up again. “Of course he was.”

I hurried after him. “But I did something stupid. Really mean and stupid.”

“Yeah, so?” James asked, reaching the landing where the portrait of the fat lady guarded our common room door. She looked to be drowsing, a half smile on her face. 

“So,” I said, pausing on the top step. “He still wants to do things together. And don’t tell me it’s ‘cause he wants my notes from charms! He’s already read the book, clear ahead til the end of term!”

“Why shouldn’t he? Want to do stuff, that is. You’re his friend aren’t you?”

“Well, yeah. Of course I am. Even if he didn’t want me to be, I still am.”

“Well, he wants you to be. Like I want you to be mine.” James moved toward the fat lady, gesturing me to follow. “Wouldn’t you keep being his friend, or mine, if we did something stupid?”

I stood still as the meaning of his words hit me. Not like a bludger. More like a huge, surprising pillow that whooshed the dread out of my guts . I got it! At last I got it! “Stay Remus’s friend? Yeah, I would, even if I can’t see him doing anything stupid.” I laughed. “As for whether I’d stay yours… Well, I think I’ve proved that part a long time ago!”

James looked at me over his shoulder. His laughter mixed with mine as he turned to the common room door and called the password to the fat lady’s portrait. “Vernal-.”

“James! Wait!” I leaped forward and grabbed his arm, half spinning him to face me. “I have one more thing to ask you!”

“What did you say?”

“I want to know-” I began. 

The voice didn’t belong to James. Over his shoulder, the fat lady’s eyes blinked open. 

“Not you, sorry.” I laughed, turning to the portrait and pointing to James. “Him. I need to ask him something…”

“What do you want to know?” asked James.

“The password!” The fat lady’s voice sounded blurry and confused as she stretched in her frame. “Did somebody begin the password?”

“I did,” said James. 

“Well then?” she yawned. “What is it?”

“Wait a minute,” said James.

“That’s not it,” she said, coming a bit more awake and sounding cross. 

“I know,” said James, turning to me. “What is it, Sirius?”

“If it was you who began it, I should think that you’d remember…” she grumbled.

“It’s vernal…” I began, laughing harder.

“No!” exclaimed James. “I mean before she woke up, what were you going to ask-?” 

“Don’t you ever go to bed?” The fat lady’s painted eyes were wide open now. “The way you lot come and go at all hours, you’d think I’m hanging around here with nothing better to do!”

“This place is full of ears!” I glanced from James to the portrait and back. How had we ever managed to keep Remus’s secret quiet as long as we had with all the portraits, poltergeists and ghosts around, not to mention students or teachers? “Come on!” I said.   
“We’ll do this in the common room if it’s empty.”

“Okay,” James nodded. “Got it. Vernal equinox!” 

“Well, it certainly took you long enough!” The portrait swung aside to let first James, and then me, climb through the hidden opening before slamming shut with a loud exclamation. “Now I want to finish getting my beauty sleep!” 

“Yeah, and she needs it, too!” James leaned round to whisper to me before heading for his favorite chair by the crackling orange fire. “Now, what did you want to ask?”

This time it was me who made a tour of the room. A book on a couch here, a quill and parchment on a table there. No students. Coming back to the hearth, and dropping to the rug beside James’s chair, I stretched my hands toward the blaze. The rising warmth was delicious against the chill early morning air. “What,” I asked, after a moment. “Did you mean when you told Remus about keeping a better watch?”

“Well, what did you think I meant?” He leaned forward, his elbows resting on his knees. He was grinning. Beneath his tousled hair, his eyes sparkled.

Did he believe we were ready? We’d gone through each step of the spell, adding one part to another and another. How often had I seen James work to reshape the tips of his ears, then their position on his head and finally their entire form? How many times over weeks, over months, over nearly three years, had I heard him murmur charms to alter his legs, his face, his feet? When had little changes begun to melt together into big ones? 

I wasn’t sure. Not for James. Or myself either. I only knew how far we’d come when one night I noticed Peter still stumbled on the phrases of the transforming spell, but I hadn’t heard James say a word before he began to reshape himself. Had my chanting of the spell also faded into silence? Well… yeah, maybe it had! Because I understood, without knowing how to explain it, that the idea of transforming had turned into a clear intent to transform. Later it was an inner image, then a sensation, of myself having been transformed. After that, for both James and me, the first slow changes came smoother and smoother, faster and faster. 

Already I knew I could pass through the ache that came with shifting the shapes of my bones, could delight in watching my hands turn to black paws, see the brightness of colors retreat a bit as smells leaped forward to meet me. But it was still classroom stuff, a spell performed over and over for the sake of learning it. One waiting for the moment it would be put to real use, like every other charm, jinx or spell I knew had waited before it! 

“James! Are you talking about the animagus charm?” 

“Of course, you twit!” he said. “What else would I be talking about?”

“But, James, you wanted to do our final test run after our O W L exams next month.” 

“Yeah, right.” If his grin got any wider it would touch his ears. “And you said we were ready to try it a month ago!”

Oh, yeah, he meant it! This was going to be so cool, so cool! “Well, you and I are ready anyway. Peter’s not. He’s too slow with the incantation.” 

I could see it clearly. James and I. Patrolling the school grounds in our animal forms. From the castle to the Whomping Willow and back again. From the Willow through the tunnel that led to Hogsmeade and into the Shrieking Shack. Taking turns checking on Remus. Keeping him company. Staying with him so he wasn’t left in delirious solitude. Keeping him safe so he didn’t hurt himself during the pain of the moon madness. Guarding him against anyone who might sneak out of the castle and begin tampering with the Willow. Against snooping gits like Snape...

Snape!

The visions faded. Were we ready, or did I only want us to be? Like I wanted to scare Snivvelus, with no thought about what it could lead to? I managed half a laugh. “Man, James, after last night, are you sure you want to be listening to me?”

James shrugged. “No. You’re right. I guess that leaves Peter, Remus and me to choose when the test run should be then, doesn’t it?” 

“What?” I scowled. He didn’t have to agree with me so fast, did he? After all, I hadn’t said I didn’t want to help with making the decision! 

Sighing, he flopped back in his chair. “This means shelving the plan til Fall then, at least. Because neither Peter nor Remus will move on my word alone. You know Peter!. A month’s too soon for him to decide what he thinks we should do. Look, he can’t even make up his mind how to answer the yes and no questions on exams for fear he’ll get them wrong!”

Was this James talking? I turned all the way round from the fire to stare up at him.   
How could he put aside our whole brilliant plan just like that? 

His head lolled on the chair cushion as he gazed at a spot somewhere between the mantle and the ceiling. His words seemed to drag themselves out, slow and heavy with resignation. “And Remus thinks we’re taking too much risk on his behalf already, by learning the charm in the first place. I don’t think he’d ever say he thinks we’re ready. It’s too bad, y’know? After spending all those nights in the library, not to mention those Saturday afternoons! By the time the two of them think we’re ready, we’ll have beards long as Dumbledore’s!”

What was with him, anyway? Two minutes ago he was talking about using the spell to help Remus, like we’d planned for years! How could he let it drift away into some far off future when we had come so close? 

“James!” I protested. “It’s crazy to wait! We said we don’t want Remus to be alone   
at the full moon! We know this is the only way! He’s not dangerous to us as animals when the moonlight transforms him!”

“But, Sirius, everything’s changed with old Snivvelus in the picture and all. What if last night didn’t really scare him off?”

I let out a sigh of exasperation. “James, have you gone mad? I thought the whole point you were making in the Hospital Wing is that it’s more important than ever to protect Remus from Snape or anyone else who’d try to come after him! And, for that matter, protect them from him as well! Even if it’s for Remus’s sake and not their own?”

James laughed. “Right you are,” he said. “So when do we start the test runs?”

“Night after tomorrow.” I said without hesitation. “Tonight we catch Remus up on the classes he missed. Tomorrow after supper we quiz each other one more time on the spell. Next night, we do it. Not in our dormitory this time, but outside under real conditions…” 

My words staggered to a stop. “You twit! You never meant to put the plan off at all!”

He laughed, then slapped me on the shoulder. “Took you long enough to figure that one out, didn’t it, mate? So, you did something totally stupid with Snape last night. Man, Sirius, we can’t have you chewing on yourself because of that every time you get a new idea, can we? I mean, you do come up with a good one now and then! And if you’d feel better about making up for last night by taking a lead part in keeping the watch we’re talking about, I have the perfect plan as to how you can do it!”

There was enough leftover regret lurking in my gut that I couldn’t be sure if he was joking, but I treated it like he was. “Well, if you think I’m going to write ‘I will not be an impulsive, hot headed git’ a hundred times, you can forget it…”

He laughed and waved the idea aside. “No! Nothing like that! You’d probably ask to borrow my quill and I’m almost out of ink. No, Sirius. What I was thinking was this. When we go outside night after tomorrow to do the test run, I think the very first one to transform himself completely should be you!”


End file.
